Renal and HIV services get a sustainability call out

Two examples of CSH supported projects, from renal and HIV, were quoted in the BMJ last week as examples of good sustainable healthcare practice which, as is most often the case,  also saved money.

Gareth Murcutt, a renal technical manager at the Royal Free Hospital in London and a current UKKA/CSH Sustainable Kidney Care Scholar realised that switching the trust’s dialysis units (wards) to central delivery systems would immediately save a typical 30 bed dialysis unit £20,000 a year in acid concentrate.

The team at the HIV Service in Northampton switched their more stable patients from twice yearly face-to-face appointments and blood tests, replacing one of these appointments with a phone call with a specialist nurse as their Green Ward Project. Over a year this saved the service £44,905 in costs and 25,958 kg CO2e—equivalent to driving 74,763 miles in a car.

For more detail, see How to save £20 000 and 780 staff hours a year on a single ward—by making one climate friendly change | The BMJ